Using The serverinfo Command To Get, Well, Server Info In Mountain Lion Server

OS X Mountain Lion Server comes with the /usr/sbin/serverinfo command. The serverinfo command can be pretty useful when you’re looking to programmatically obtain information about the very basic state of an OS X Server.

The first option indicates whether the Server app has been downloaded from the app store, which is the –software option:

serverinfo --software

When used, this option reports the following if the Server.app can be found:

This system has server software installed.

Or if the software cannot be found, the following is indicated:

This system does NOT have server software installed.

The –productname option can be used to determine the name of the software app:

serverinfo --productname

If you change the name of the app from Server then the serverinfo won’t work any longer, so the output should always be the following:

Server

The –shortversion command returns the version of the Server app being used:

serverinfo --shortversion

The output will not indicate a build number, but instead the version of the app on the computer the command is run on:

2.0.23

To see the build, use the –buildversion option:

serverinfo --buildversion

The output shows the build of server, which doesn’t necessarily match the OS X build number:

12S307

Just because the Server app has been downloaded doesn’t mean the Server setup assistant has been run. To see if it has, use the –configured option:

serverinfo --configured

The output indicates whether the system is running as a server or just has the app installed (e.g. if you’re using it to connect to another server:

This system has server software configured.

You can also output all of the information into a single, easy to script against property list using the –plist option:

The Server Root can reside in a number of places. To see the path (useful when scripting commands that are relative to the ServerRoot:

serverinfo --prefix

By default, the output is as follows:

/Applications/Server.app/Contents/ServerRoot

You can also see whether the system is running on actual hardware desgnated by Apple for servers using the –hardware option:

serverinfo --hardware

The output simply indicates if the hardware shipped with OS X Server on it from Apple:

This system is NOT running on server hardware.

The –perfmode option indicates whether or not the performance mode has been enabled, dedicating resources to binaries within the Server app:

serverinfo --perfmode

If the performance mode has not been enabled then the output will be as such:

Server performance mode is NOT enabled.

To enable performance mode, you can also use serverinfo. This is the only task that the command does that can make any changes to the system and as such is the only time you need to elevate privileges: